


dream a little dream of me

by gendernoncompliant



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Established Relationship, Fluff, Introspection, Late Night Conversations, M/M, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:53:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23950366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gendernoncompliant/pseuds/gendernoncompliant
Summary: “When you dream,” Duke repeats, his voice soft. “Can you—you know. Feel things?”
Relationships: Duke Crocker/Nathan Wuornos
Comments: 12
Kudos: 45





	dream a little dream of me

**Author's Note:**

> Just a stray thought that I wanted to explore. Let me know what you think!

Duke stares at the back of Nathan’s head in the dark. He entertains the idea of leaving him be, letting him sleep.

“Hey,” he asks, at a volume that could only be considered a whisper on a technicality. Nathan grunts a vague response but doesn’t so much as move. Duke pushes forward, anyway, caught in the grip of an idle thought he’s been trying to shake for the last hour. “Can you feel, in your dreams?”

Nathan seems much less interested in the question than he is.

He rolls over to face Duke, a half-awake frown creasing his brows. Letting out a put-upon sigh that Duke considers to be a little over dramatic, Nathan drawls, “Run that by me again?”

Duke trails his fingers along Nathan’s side. Nathan’s non-reaction used to be a strange thing—its own kind of surreal, waking dream. Duke knew to expect the big things, but the absence of the small ones was more noticeable, at first, than he’d thought it would be. He didn’t think about how Nathan wouldn’t shiver under light touches or instinctively lean into his hands, wouldn’t mindlessly echo the circling of Duke’s thumb over his knuckles or shift to make room for Duke’s legs.

Nathan does all of those things, but as a conscious, continuous effort. It isn’t something he can do with his eyes closed.

That Nathan trusts him enough to close his eyes around him at all means something; Duke doesn’t take that for granted.

“When you dream,” Duke repeats, his voice soft. “Can you—you know. Feel things?”

Nathan watches his own knuckles brush along Duke’s collarbone as if they don’t belong to him.

“Sometimes,” Nathan murmurs. He doesn’t look away from the point of contact. He doesn’t react, at first, to Duke’s hand on his thigh. But after a moment he shifts forward, and Duke makes room for Nathan’s knee between his own.

There’s a metaphor in there, somewhere, Duke muses with a private smile: Nathan pushing and Duke making space. Nathan charging forward and Duke working out the details.

In Duke’s own dreams, touch is often an ill-fitting synonym of itself. It crops up at the wrong times or in the wrong ways—inconsistent, unfocused. In his dreams, touch becomes something of an impressionist painting. At the right distance it makes a full, coherent picture. Step in too close and the parts become less than the whole.

Duke doesn’t realize the quiet until Nathan breaks it with a self-conscious. “It’s not the same.”

“Fuzzy,” Duke offers.

Nathan’s gaze flits to his. “Like… I’m in a spacesuit. And everything’s—right there.”

Duke wonders if that’s what Nathan’s trouble makes him feel like: an astronaut or a deep-sea diver, surrounded by a world he can’t touch.

Nathan watches as Duke links their fingers together in the space between them. When Duke squeezes his hand, Nathan squeezes back. He’s so _focused_ —like it’s a play and he’s terrified of forgetting his lines.

For someone who’s always been so withholding, Nathan’s awfully easy to read. At least to Duke. He doesn’t like to talk about his trouble. Not like this. Not without sarcasm, or bored resignation, or righteous fury to hide behind. Duke is rarely privy to the kind of reluctant vulnerability he’s being offered, in this moment. He can’t resist the pull of one more question.

“Is it better or worse, when you can feel them?”

Duke thinks of all the times he dreamed himself a better life only to wake up stuck in the same place, treading the same water.

Nathan sighs. “It’s not a big deal, Duke,” he argues weakly, rolling over to face the ceiling. He doesn’t pull his hand free of Duke’s, though. It’s a pointed gesture, since Nathan can’t know what he can’t see. “They’re just dreams.”

Duke doesn’t argue with him. Sometimes, with Nathan, it’s better to let him have the quiet. Sometimes, he’ll talk himself back around all on his own. The quiet drags on long enough that Duke starts to think Nathan’s abandoned his thoughts and returned to actual dreaming. However, after what seems like an eternity in the dark, Nathan murmurs a wistful, “It’s nice.”

Duke can’t help but smile.

Confident that they’ve exceeded their quota of emotional vulnerability for the day, Duke lightens the mood—leaning hard into the playful innuendo when he teases, “Ever dream about me?”

For someone who can’t feel, Nathan sure wields a pillow with frightening accuracy. It lands across Duke’s face with a loud _thwap_ and Duke erupts into laughter in his scramble to scuttle away. “God, it was just a question!” Duke giggles, peering out from between his fingers.

“Stop asking questions and go to sleep,” Nathan says, but the warmth in his voice undercuts any feigned irritation. When he plants his hands on either side of Duke’s head and hovers just above him, Duke thinks he understands how it could be possible for Nathan to still go breathless without being able to feel Duke’s hands on him.

That night, Nathan dreams about kisses that feel like a photograph taken out of focus. It’s the most clarity he’s had in years.


End file.
